What do these cops do when these situations happen and there is no video recording of the encounter? They all back each other up and write up some bogus police report justifying the need for force. That’s exactly what would have happened if we didn’t get the recording this time around. These four cops would have straight lied.
Let’s say we effectively deter them from doing so with liberal use of cameras. I think if they are really rotten, they will find ways to drum up other charges.
There are two paths of discussion here, one path assumes the cops are mostly good and do bad things in very intense, escalated situations. The other is they are rotten, and do something bad in any situation such as wrongfully detain, concoct charges, forge evidence, or justify a violent escalation.
If we’re dealing with a rotten police community, where they operate with a clear power complex and mafia—esque collusion amongst each other, then we must confront that word, systemic.
Violence is just one by-product of a systemic problem. Lying, manipulation, imposition of unrestricted authority in any/all contexts, and so on.
If systemically there is a 20% prevalence of rotten behavior, numbers straight out of my ass of course, we’re talking 1 in 5 interactions are tainted with the public. We have to find out what the real number is, because I do believe that number exists and it ain’t below 10%.
Asking the police to provide us this data is about the same as asking the CCP for police data. We need serious transparency into this organization.